Marquez takes Austrian MotoGP pole -- by 0.002 seconds!

World champion Marc Marquez, riding a Honda, grabbed pole position today for the Austrian MotoGP, edging the Ducatis of Italian Andrea Dovizioso and Spaniard Jorge Lorenzo as Valentino Rossi toiled.

"What a fight! What a pole!" the Honda team tweeted after a dominant performance a week ago in the Czech Grand Prix, the Ducatis arrived in Austria hoping to further trim the huge points lead Marquez has built with five victories in 10 races this season.

Instead, Marquez delivered a fastest lap of 1min 23.241sec in the second and final qualifying session, just two thousandths of a second faster than Dovizioso, the winner in Brno, with Lorenzo, the runner-up a week earlier, third, 0.135sec back.

"It's the same gaining pole positions by a thousandth as by a second," Marquez said after gaining the 49th pole position of his career.

The two factory Ducatis will be alongside him on the front row, which Dovizioso said was good enough.

"The front row, that's always the objective," said the Italian.

"I am content with the time that I did, I didn't expect it. The conditions were strange, with the rain we've had." Spielberg has been a happy hunting ground for Ducati since the track returned to the MotoGP calendar in 2016.

That year, Ducati swept the top places and last season the lead changed hands twice on the final bend as Dovizioso edged Marquez to win.

"Here, it's as if its Ducati-Land," Marquez said.

"They are very fast."
"This was returning like Nadal, now we'll see tomorrow how we take advantage, but all weekend I've felt good."